Friendly Fire
by Madame Tango
Summary: Natasha Romanoff, Natalie Rushman, Natalia Romanova, the Black Widow - she had plenty of names but mother? Could that really be her next title? A one-shot exploring the emotional and physical impact of one moment in time on the Black Widow. Set just after New York.


Friendly Fire

Desolation –she was no stranger to it and yet this time it was different. This time that feeling of loss, of being alone in a world of billions of people was tinged with something else, something... more.

Confusion?

Yes definitely and fear.

Fear, not a feeling the Black Widow admitted to very often She was lost and alone and yet she wasn't, not anymore, not at this moment anyway. She looked back at the piece of plastic on the sink. The blue lines, one strong and thick and the other thin and light and her hand skimmed involuntarily across her stomach. But for how long, she thought, how long.

The Red Room... the experiments. She never expected she could, she didn't think... Her hands rested on her stomach again and she looked down trying to see if there was any sign that it was true, that it was really happening. But there was nothing. Her stomach was still flat and toned, the abdomen of an assassin, a trained killer. Natasha Romanov - the Black Widow, Avenger, assassin and ...mother?

"No!" she shouted involuntarily. She looked down and shook her head sadly.

"No," she repeated softly. It couldn't happen, it wasn't happening. This happened to other people, to women in surburbia with husbands and jobs. Teachers, doctors, shop assistants. Not assassins, trained to kill to deceive, seduce... "Maybe one day?" she thought to herself. One day she would be ready, if her body could even cope. One day she might have someone, have a life for a child to share but now, now the world was changing and she was part of something. Was it arrogance to think she was needed more by the world than by one small person? Or was she just steeling herself for loss, getting in first?

They had saved the world and she had the feeling they would have to do it again and again. You couldn't do that with a baby on your hip. Could you? The Black Widow looked at the plastic again, at the five pieces of plastic – all different; different brands, different sizes but all the same.

A million things and nothing filled her head.

She was lost in her thoughts in the steel grey of a SHIELD carrier bathroom. She braced herself against the metal sink and stared in the mirror. It was four weeks since the battle of New York and she was about to go back on active duty tomorrow. But could she? Would she? In her line of work there were contingency plans and protocols for this sort of thing – of course there were. With her particular skill set this could be an occupational hazard –there were precautions but she didn't know what they were - this had never happened, it couldn't, she was damaged goods.

She tried again not think of her own childhood – stolen by the Red Room. She tried not to think of all the things she'd lost, all the things she thought she'd lost, all the things she could still lose. Her hand crossed her stomach again and she looked back in the mirror. Still she saw nothing but the woman she was now. She was dressed in black and her hair was crimson to match the crimson that stained a trained-killer's soul. She stroked her finger tips across her middle – would this, could this, clean her ledger? If she believed in fairytales then maybe this would be a miracle, but fairytales, like love was for children and there were protocols. This wasn't a human life was it? It's a work injury, a bullet wound – a knife slice, a fetal injury. But wouldn't that just be more red and would it last, would it even survive?

She tried to think about when and this started, but there was nothing – nothing that could... Suddenly her mind returned to the end of the battle, tired bones, adrenalin flowing, a stolen moment in the dark. Her heart broke. This was not a battle wound – not inflicted by the enemy. "Friendly fire!" she whispered almost inaudibly.

"Friendly fire," the widow repeated and a tear stole its down her face.


End file.
